garage door trauma and cute people...

Instead of showing the glass window in the garage that Peter broke playing basketball this week, 

and instead of showing the new huge dent in the garage door that I did 

the very next day by running into said door with the golf cart,

I'll show you these precious pictures...

Campbell has been wanting to make a pumpkin pie. Thursday after school, we fulfilled that wish.

  

Today was the foam party for 2nd grade boys. It was open for siblings as well. 

What a foamy fun time the children had.

Sadie and Campbell

Bishop, Alex and Matthew.

sudsa fun

Alex and his cottontail

Crazy egg hunt!

Alex has now decided he wants a foam party for his birthday.

Trip pics ~ day 3

We were up and out of the hotel early to go visit Peter's grandparents, Ralph & Betty.  It was great to see them. I think we've been to Irvine five times since Conleigh was born. They live in a great community and Ralph has been greeting walkers around the lake weekday mornings for years. He and his friends meet at "the bench," and say hello to many a'walker.
I've heard about the bench for a long time, but I've never been to 'the bench.'  This trip we went to 'the bench.'  The weather wasn't great, so sadly his friends didn't come that day, but he still greeted people he recognized and those he didn't.

We all went out to lunch, and then we spent a little time at their house. There is a playground right outside their door. Times sure have changed because we just let the kids go out there by themselves this time. No parental oversight.

Grandma had made 'the birthday cake.'  The famous Hardin birthday cake!

Conleigh blew out the candles...

Peter played with the new camera. Pretty cool shot of the hummingbird....

and Alex and Campbell wrestled.

Trip Pics ~ Day 2

Welcome to Hollywood! What's your dream? Everybody comes here; this is Hollywood, land of dreams. Some dreams come true, some don't; but keep on dreamin' - this is Hollywood. Always time to dream, so keep on dreamin'. 

We drove up the coast on Thursday through Oceanside where they have had a farmer's market open the past two times we have been by.  This time we left with a new poncho thing for me. I love it. And a huge jug of olive oil.  The 89 year old man selling it said he made it himself.  Not until we got back to Austin did Peter notice the package says, "made in italy."  We laughed.

Michael Jackson's star

We headed for Hollywood. I can't believe I didn't take a picture of the sign. blah.  Needless to say, it is underwhelming and the kids were sticking close.  Peter said it is better than he remembers it as a child, but there are still too many bag people for comfort.

Look our singer Campbell has her own star too!!

For you, Dad!

 There was a wax museum, and Guinness World record museum and Ripley's Believe it or Not.  I convinced Peter we should do one of them, so we went into Ripley's. It was a good call. Weird stuff, but it entertained all of us.

Creepy unicorn man.

Conleigh chillin' with MJ.

 From Hollywood, we drove through Beverly Hills. No star sightings but a ton of traffic.  We landed at the Santa Monica pier.  You always see pictures of it but I loved being there and it wasn't overly crowded which was great too.

see the girls in the back car of the pier coaster? they were the only ones on the ride.

Alex chose to give a game a try for his activity. No luck.

See my new poncho?

We ate dinner in Venice beach and fell into beds at the hotel. Seriously, our lights were off by 8:30pm (which is 10:30 in TX).

Trip pics ~ Day 1

Good intentions of writing the blog this year have fallen to the way side.

We went to San Diego over spring break to see dear friends and family.

We all had a wonderful, relaxing, yet filled with fun time.

We flew on Conleigh's birthday. Southwest was cool and made an announcement on the plane about her celebrating #10. Then on the way off the plane, they let her get in the cockpit and take a pic. It is on my phone, so  I can't post it here.

birthday girl

Thankfully, we had a direct flight and arrived in SD before noon Cali time. We set off for Balboa Park. Beautiful place. Gardens, museums, parks, flowers. It was wonderful.

checking out the Koi pond at Balboa.

Beauty.  We are loving our new camera!

Silly boy.  I wish you could see how blue his eyes are in this picture.

 After that adventure, we headed to our friends Karri and Kevin's house. We were all excited to see them and their kids, our God children, Ashley & Brandon. It has been 2 years since we have seen the kids.  Basically, we dumped our bags out of the car and hit the road for birthday dinner on the beach per the birthday girls request.

What a great looking group of kids!

Guess which photographer requested this silly pose? Peter, of course.

True personalities!  Nothing beats the beach!

All five kids slept in Brandon's room. Boys on the floor, Campbell on top bunk and Ashley & Conleigh shared the full on the bottom.  You can imagine sleep time didn't begin when we said goodnight. It was a party in that room every night. :)

Goodnight!

Straight Hair

Oh, the woes of girl hair.  Conleigh longs for straight hair. Her curls are beautiful and others would do much to have such soft curls.  We got her hair cut the other night and had the stylist blow it out straight. She is in love with it! I'll admit she looks much older and very pretty.

First, it's a little far away but here she is last weekend before the Father - Daughter dance...

 And,  a shot of the back straight --

 And finally, our beautiful, getting bigger and smarter and more confident all the time girl...

I'm back

I guess I needed a break from the blog. I'm back though.  So far, 2013 has been off to a busy start.  We just finished basketball season for Alex on Sunday, Conleigh continued her volleyball pursuits that evening and Campbell will begin basketball on Wednesday - just as Alex heads off to baseball practice.  I LOVE these times.

It seems like my thoughts have been coming in tweet size packages  lately. Since I gave up facebook for Lent, I opened a twitter account while I was at a work conference on Friday. They encouraged us to use our phones to tweet, so I was just following directions.  :)  I haven't tweeted at all, but I can tell you that as a follower of Deepak Chopra and the Motley Fool, they tweet often!

We have been playing musical beds in our house lately.  It has been wonderful to have company.  Larry & Kathryn came to hold down the troops while Peter & I enjoyed a super fun night out with friends at the Austin Rodeo Gala last weekend.  12 of us piled into the Bongo bus and headed downtown for a great auction, meal and concert by Dierks Bentley. We danced and laughed. It was a great time.

As we waved goodbye to Larry & Kathryn, Mark Robinson drove into town for a two night stay. The kids loved having him here and Peter and I get a kick out of all his plans.

This past weekend my parents drove in to see us and to watch Alex's basketball team, the Warriors, in their basketball tourney. It was so much fun. Really, the first challenge the boys have had all season.  Unfortunately, the season ended in the quarterfinals. I felt like we were in a movie everytime anyone scored. The whole spectator section would just roar!

Seriously, my parents and Peter's mom Sarah passed on the highway between Austin and Houston. Sarah came to help out because I had a work conflict yesterday and forgot the kids were off to celebrate our President's.  Thanks for the help Sarah.  I was also sick for the second time in two weeks. Doc said that I have bronchitis, and 24 hours on meds makes a world of difference.

Self Portrait